A message in the bottle

Dear Cell, last Friday we put all cell questions aside and turned the focus on ourselves. We shared about how busy we were in our family and our work. For most of us, our work has kept us busy – for some, we were nearly buried in our work. Next came our family. Almost all of us are married with children and children can be more than a handful. Our children keep us busy round the clock both mentally and physically.

Taking care of our loved ones can consume us in more ways than one. When we are not with them, we worry about their well-being. When we are with them, we spent every conscious moments tending to their need. We worry about their past – thinking how that fall, that discipline, that experience would affect them when they grow up. We also worry about their future – wishing that they would grow up well and healthy, hoping that they can cope with their studies and praying that we do not inadvertently neglect them due to the busyness of our work.

Then, some worries are metaphysical. We worry about their spiritual growth. We are concerned about their identity as a Christian in a world where there are more questions to be asked than answered. We fret over how we can protect and nurture them and ultimately make them feel proud of us as their tireless, devoted and loving parents; who are only human beings making the same mistakes that our parents once made when they were taking care of us. In the end, we want the best for our children but at times, feeling guilty when we cannot consistently be the best for them.

So, as a cell group, we are busy living for others. For our company, we are responsible employees, scuttling around beating that deadline, hanging out late in the office finishing off that pile of work, and hoping that we do not make irredeemable corporate mistakes that can get us fired. And for our children, we are the ever-present help in times of need, more like a 7-11 for them “always close but never closed” and a refuge and a fortress to be the first to bear the series of storms of life that come their way. In fact, we are so busy at times living for others that we forget to live for ourselves. This is the crux of my message. This is the reason for my writing to you. Have you forgotten to live for yourself?

No, I am not talking about giving yourself a break, going for a vacation, rest and relax in some remote resort taking in the sun, sand and sea. This is secondary to my message. Recently I read a book, Success Built to Last by Jerry Porras, Steward Emery and Mark Thompson. The whole book can be summed up as a book about finding personal meaning. The authors define success as a life and work that brings personal fulfillment and last relationships and makes a difference in the world in which we live. Some of the pertinent questions raised by them are: who am I? What do I stand for? What is my purpose? How do I maintain my sense of self in this chaotic, unpredictable world? How do I infuse meaning into my life and work? How do I remain renewed, engaged and stimulated? It is my personal conviction that until we find personal meaning in our lives, and not just adopting meaning from others or paying lip service to it, we will never experience meaningful engagement in the things that we do now and in the future. Even the mundane activities we do for our work and family can be unknowingly subsumed into our meaningful framework if we first have one to start with.

Finding personal meaning in our lives is like riding a bike. Once we are on the bike and cycling, we will never lose our balance and fall. But once we stop cycling, the balance becomes a personal struggle and our fall is inevitable. The act of cycling is the momentum of meaning that keeps all things in our lives moving in a forward direction. Once we lose sight of our personal meaning, or dilute it with distractions and stresses of life, the balancing act of our work, family and personal life become insuperable, insurmountable and very exhausting. The fall is just a matter of time, and for some, the fall is permanent.

So, who are you? And what do you stand for? In the book, the authors encourage us to be clock builders. When I was on London in the mid-1990s, I lost my watch and had to rely on passerby to tell time. But, while most Brits were polite and always greeted you with endearing terms like “hey love” or “darling”, some of them, only the minority, can be quite rude and wholly oblivious to your presence; especially if you were a bespectacled Chinese with messy hair and a tongue that pronounced the number 12 as “chop”. So, I sometimes had to go without knowing the time for a while until one of the nice British ladies pointed me to Big Ben, the humongous tower clock hanging high up there for all to see at the heart of London city. From then on, I knew I would not be chronologically challenged anymore. I can always tell time whenever, wherever I want because I have Big Ben.

Beloved, are you a Big Ben to your children, spouse and friends? Can they rely on you for help and life-direction when they are lost, derailed or depressed? Are you a source of meaning, inspiration and hope for them when they come calling?

God has called us to be the shining light of the world, the preserving salt of lives we meet or married. Our personal meaning as Christian comes from this short scripture, “He that believes on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living waters.” (1 John 5:5) Imagine how refreshing that is! Most of our lives are as dry as a poached desert. Our thirst for satisfaction always remains unsatisfied. We jump from one sensation to another, seeking one material goal after another, and praying for what we want but never really enjoying what we already have.

We have altogether confused what is urgent with what is important, what is momentarily satisfying with what is eternally meaningful, and what is material success with what is personal significance. We do not experience the refreshing, empowering and renewing flow of God’s spirit like living waters in our belly because we have lost, put aside or ignored the true meaning of life and abandoned our calling. Instead of being clock builders, we hide our watches on our wrists, covering it up with our long sleeves, and feeling indispensable and self-important doing so. We have kept our light under our bed and the salt in the altar bottle, capped up tightly and unreachable to many. In other words, we are busy making disciples but have failed to become one in the process. We therefore live our Christian lives playing “Martha” to Jesus in the work that we do and not “Mary” to Jesus in the heart that remains true.

“Martha” Christians can be as toxic as unfeeling atheists. Recently I read about one devoted Christian parents who gave birth to a daughter who suffered from a serious brain condition called anencephaly. This disease prevented the poor baby’s brain from developing. The child literally had no brain. The doctors gave the verdict most succinctly and medically as such, “Her condition is not compatible with life.” Needless to say, the child will never lead a normal life. She will never get to open her eyes. She couldn’t smile like normal children. And part of the deformity was her exposed tissue at the back of her skull that had to be covered and dressed regularly. You’d have thought things couldn’t get any worse than this? Well, you can banish that thought when the parents, who had been attending church faithfully before the birth of their daughter, received a call from the church one Sunday morning telling them that their daughter would no longer be welcome in the nursery. The reason the caller gave was this: the moms in church had met up and have decided that their daughter might die in their care and traumatize some volunteer workers in the nursery!

Brennan Manning once echoed these haunting words about Christians, “The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christian who acknowledge Jesus with their lips then walk out the door and deny him by their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable.”

Beloved, let’s not forget why we exist in the first place. Our coming into this world has to do with a much higher calling than just growing up, getting married, giving birth (for female only), getting a job, getting promoted, getting adored and admired, growing old, and dying unfulfilled, and for most of us, dying not realizing that one is unfulfilled. Let’s be authentic Christian – living with purpose and serving with gratefulness. If God is not in the center of your life, kick yourself out of the center. A bumper sticker shares the same sentiment, “If God is your co-pilot…switch seats now!” In the end, it doesn’t take much to be an authentic Christian. It starts with your heart. It starts with reminding yourself why you are here, what do you stand for, and what legacy you want to leave behind when you leave. The Bible is replete with answers to all these questions and he or she who takes the time to find them, finds what I call the “Key to a Life flowing with Rivers of Living Waters.”

One sure way of renewing our faith and setting our course to being an authentic Christian is to bear in our heart the 6 empowering reasons why an octogenarian, John Stott, became and remains, till this day, a Christian worth his salt and light.

The first reason is that of God’s love that is spelt out in Luke 19:10, “For the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.” It is God’s initiative and not ours. In our loneliness, we can always rest in the safety of this thought: our divine lover never forgot us and never will.

The second reason is: Jesus said; Jesus did. In other words, Jesus talked the talk and walked the walk. He fulfilled the scriptures (Luke 4:18-19). He initiated the intimacy with us by establishing His intimacy with God. He spoke and lived his life with authority and made the way for us to exercise the same authority over life, over death and over all dominion. In our trials and afflictions, we can always be assured that life has already been overcome and victory attained.

The third reason is the cross of Christ. My beloved, this love is surely authentic. To lay down one’s life for another is the pinnacle of unselfish love. Jesus did it. Jesus endured it. Jesus died for us. The amazing thing about this is this: Jesus would gladly give His life to us again if it were ever in God’s plan of redemption. But we all know that one sacrifice is sufficient. One life for all is the ultimate plan. In all our pain, we can always find the strength and courage to endure because we are not alone in our suffering and we know whatever endurance will bear much fruit in this life and the life thereafter.

The fourth reason is how undeserving we are to be called God’s very own. This understanding takes deep contemplation and humility. The proud will never need God because they have nothing in them that requires any pardon. So they think.

Let’s be honest with ourselves. We are far from perfect. And I am not even talking about the silly mistakes we make, our forgetfulness, our inadvertent Freudian slip of the tongue. If we go deeper, look inside our locked mental closet and peer into our soulish desires and designs, we will find an ugliness lurking, and so deeply embedded, that we are totally powerless and helpless to extricate. With humility, we will inevitably come to a point to admit that we indeed need a savior. So, in our failings and disappointments, we can always rely on an ever-present savior who understands how we have failed and how we can be redeemed and reconciled to Him one day.

Let’s stop here for a while and read this quote from Bishop Richard Holloway that put it so eloquently and poetically, “This is my dilemma…I am dust and ashes, frail and wayward, a set of predetermined behavioral responses…riddled with fears, beset with needs…the quintessence of dust and unto dust I shall return…But there is something else in me…Dust I may be, but troubled dust, dust with dreams, dust that has strange premonition of transfiguration, of a glory in store, a destiny prepared, an inheritance that will one day be my own…So my life is stretched out in a painful dialectic between ashes and glory, between weakness and transfiguration. I am a riddle to myself, an exasperation enigma…this strange duality of dust and glory.”

The fifth reason is freedom in Christ. We are free to live our lives victoriously, without shame, without regrets because Jesus has redeemed it all. John Stott says it best, “Firstly, I have been saved (or freed) in the past from the penalty of sin by a crucified Savior. Secondly, I am being saved (or freed) in the present from the power of sin by a living Savior. Thirdly, I shall be saved (or freed) in the future from the presence of sin by a coming Savior.” In our doubts, we can always find in our heart the assurance that our past, present and future have already been secured and we can live our lives facing today with the same confidence and hope we will have when we see Jesus again.

And lastly, Jesus fulfilled all our earthly aspirations. In Christ, all the dots in our lives are connected. Our meaning is made clear. Our lives renewed and refreshed. In the words of Michelangelo, “When I am yours, then at last I am completely myself.” Beloved, to find yourself, you have to be in God. And to be in God is where your life will ultimately flourish with meaning and purpose. In conclusion, let me recite a contemporary spin on Mark 8:35, “If you insist on holding on to yourself and living for yourself and refusing to let yourself go, you will lose yourself. But if you are prepared to lose yourself, to give yourself away in love for God and your fellow human beings, then in that moment of complete abandon, when you think you have lost everything, the miracle takes place and you find yourself.”

Dear cell, the months ahead will be trying for some. Our work, our family are enough to keep us really busy. We might see less of some of you. But let our hearts be joined together. Let’s keep coming together for a good cause. And a good cause is self-sustaining, enduring and always hoping. We will brave through the coming months always remembering what we had shared together as a cell group over the years and grow even stronger in the spirit and in love when we do meet again in the near future. May God show you what is the true meaning of success in your life and lead you out of your wilderness into his marvelous, glorious light!

Friday's Recap (170409)

Last Friday, we shared about the human heart. William Faulkner, winner of the Nobel Prize for literature, once said, "only one thing is worth writing about...the human heart in conflict with itself." And yesterday's discussion was centered on how a heart transformation can lead to a life of meaning and purpose. How a change of heart can bring about the right words and deed. How a heart convicted can make even the hardest core sinner into a person usable by God to achieve the impossible. This is not some self-improvement psycho-babble; it is the essence of our being, the highest goal of human existence. When the heart is renewed, aligned and submitted to God, our life becomes a force to be reckoned with.

Let me quote Luke 18:9 about the Pharisee and the Tax Collector to prove my point. The parable is about two men who profess to believe in God but end up with very different conviction. Their prayers to God tell it all. The pharisee prayed, "God, I thank you that I am not like the other men - extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector...I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess." This prayer has all the characteristics of a man who doesn't need God. It's a wonder that he even bothered to pray to God since he had all the religious trappings of a "good" and "righteous" man. The irony is that such a man is intolerant to a fault and yet he epitomizes what is truly wrong with Christianity then and today. He has essentially forgotten that Christianity is not a morality contest in the likes of Miss Congeniality.

In a Miss Congeniality contest, the crowning queen only needs to satisfy one criteria: Is she the most popular girl of them all? For the pharisee, a similar question would be: Is he the most moral person of them all? By all external standards, based on Mosaic rules and precepts, the pharisee wins it hands down - his prayer says it all. He is no extortioner, unjust, adulterer and he has fulfilled all the dos and don'ts of his religion. But did he? What can we say about the tax collector?

The tax collector has much less drama than the pharisee. He stood afar, head held low and, with both hands thumping his chest, he cried out, "God, be merciful to me a sinner!" When we compare the pharisee and the tax collector, we find an oxymoronic contrast. One thinks he's righteous but he's far from it. The other thinks he is not but he is much closer than he thinks. One thinks he's the apple of God's eye but a rotten apple at that. The other thinks he's rotten to the core but is accepted by God as His beloved. One thinks he is exalted but is universally despised. The other thinks he is despised but wholly justified. What makes this contrast so stark and revealing is that both received the same teaching but experienced a totally different heart conviction. That is why Proverbs 4:23 cautions, "Above all, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life."

The conclusion of the parable is instructive. "I tell you," Jesus admonished. "this man (the tax collector) went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted." In fact, the history of Christianity is littered with the evil works of men of God who profess with their mouths what they do not in their lifetime believe in their hearts. And most unfortunately, they became stumbling blocks for many well-intentioned believers whose faith were seriously affected by their hypocrisy.

If you read the history of the grand inquisition which lasted for about 600 years from the early 13th century to the late 18th century, you will convulse at the atrocities committed by the Catholic devout and priests, especially the Dominican/Francisican friars, in the name of God. Many perfectly good Christians, ardent followers of Christ and martyrs of God were killed by the so-called God's chosen ones or peasant crusaders who were conveniently handpicked by the Pope during that time to do His unholiness' dirty work. No one was spared by the Inquisition's overreaching hand of perverted justice. As long as they were labeled as heretics, their fate were sealed. And mind you, it was then easy to be guilty of being a heretic. You don't have to openly object to the practises of the Catholic Church or start a new movement in protest to the establishment to be persecuted.

During the height of the Inquisitorial fanaticism, women with a facial mole, a bad temper or no husband and who domesticated many wild cats could be hauled up for interrogation and be subsequently punished, tortured or burned at the stake. Even death was no refuge for the victims. Many rotting corpses were exhumed and tried for heresy and put to flames. And their properties were confiscated by these hypocritical, self-styled pious soldiers of God for self-profit. One victim of the Spanish Inquisition cried out, "I was torn in pieces by the devils that rack the brains of unhappy men. Do God's eyes not reach to the prisons of the Inquisition?"

Recently, I bought a book entitled Losing my Religion authored by a journalist, William Lobdell. He was once a Christian but he later lost his faith when he started to report about religion in America. If you read his book, you will note that William's belief was seriously challenged when he reported about the sexual abuses of the Catholic priests. These priests repeatedly molested, abused and raped young children, both boys and girls, some as young as 11 years old, and most of these acts were covered up by the Church by the latter destroying the records, paying the victims to keep quiet and transfering the offending priests to another parish. In the end, the Church had to pay millions to the victims and their families for the unspeakable pain and torment their so called shepherds of God had inflicted on those who reposed on them their utmost trust, complete faith and spiritual well-being.

Beloved, as Christians, we will do well to be reminded of William's conclusion when he wrote, "If the Lord is real, it would make sense for the people of God, on average, to be superior morally and ethically to the rest of society. Statistically, they aren't. I also believe that God's institutions, on average, should function on a higher moral plain than governments or corporations. I don't see any evidence of this. It's hard to believe in God when it's impossible to tell the difference between His people and atheists."

Indeed, Jesus had foreseen how evil an unrepentant, unregenerated and unreformed heart can be, what such a person is capable of, and how he or she can be a stumbling block to many sincere Christians out there. That is also why Jesus reserved the worst rebuke for the teachers of the Law. It therefore bears repeating what Proverb has to say, "Above all, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life."

As much as I empathize with William's disillusionment with faith, I however do not agree with his conclusion. Romans 3:23 says, "All have sinnned and fell short of the glory of God." We are all human and perfection is definitely not our inalienable right at birth. We are all born flawed, for some, seriously flawed. If given a chance and given time, William will find out that there are good Christians as well as bad; just like there will always be good atheist as well as bad ones. Christians do not have the final say on morality; we do not monopolize moral standards. If I may use an analogy, God is our piano-tuner and we are his piano. God knows how each key or string is to be tuned and there is only one way to tune them. For example, the key of middle C can only be tuned in such a way that it sounds in harmony with the key that comes before it (key B) and the key that comes after it (key D). So, with this in mind, my question is: do we condemn the piano because it is out of tune and throw it away? Well, to do so would be silly because an out-of-tune piano is not useless, unplayable or spoilt. If properly tuned by the master tuner, the piano can still churn on masterpieces when placed in the hands of a maestro pianist.

So, it is with Christians. We are out-of-tuned pianos. God is our master tuner. He is still working on us and none of us can claim that we are fully tuned par excellence. It is therefore not the religion that is flawed. It is the person practising it. William, in his anguish, had committed the error of categorization. He has lumped the religion with the practitioner together and had effectively threw the bath water of religion out of the door together with the Christian baby. Philosopher Keith Ward put it most elegantly this way, "My conclusion is that all human beings, religious or not, are prone to evil. Human beings are dangerous, and anything they believe or do will probably go terribly wrong at some point. The question is: how can we best guard against that? The best safeguard is a set of beliefs that convicts humans of wrongdoing and promises them a reconciliation with a personal being of supreme goodness...Religion does not lead to corruption. Human nature leads to corruption. If we let human beings into our religion, it is going to be corrupted."

So, it all boils down to our heart, the conviction of the heart. This is man's greatest struggle. This is also where changes should be made and where the changes, once made, would be most effective and most long lasting. A man who listens with his mind or rationalizes with his head knowledge knows and does only so much, and last only so long. But a man convicted in his heart is, as I had said earlier, a force to be reckoned with. And the greatest act of history starts with the transformation of the heart. Here's what William Law has to say about this crucial subject, "Would you know who is the greatest saint in the world? It is not he who prays most or fasts most; it is not he who gives most alms or is most eminent for temperance, chastity, or justice; but it is he who is always thankful to God, who wills everything that God wills, who receives everything as an instance of God's goodness, and has a heart always ready to praise God for it."

Let me end with John 21:15-17. The scripture describes events after Peter denied Jesus three times. When Jesus appeared to Peter, he challenged Peter three times with the same question: "Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me?" Just as much time as Peter denied him, he was asked whether he loves Jesus and his answer were the same but it grew in emphasis, intensity and, I believe, conviction. When Peter replied, "Yes Lord, you know that I love you." Jesus answered, "Feed my lamb". The second time Peter replied, Jesus said, "Tend my sheep." The last time, Jesus said, "Feed my sheep."

Beloved, can you see the process here. From lamb (baby sheep) to sheep, the process is all about growth, spiritual growth. Don't expect an overnight transformation of the heart. Let me reinforce this point by quoting verse 18, "Most assuredly, I say to you, when you were younger, you girded yourself and walked where you wished; but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will gird you and carry you where you do not wish." Peter grew by surrendering his will to God and gradually developed in his spirit a force which initially was no bigger than a pebble to a reckoning force called the rock where the church of Jesus was laid as its firm foundation.

This is the same Peter who was impulsive, temperamental, hardly modest, overtly self-assertive and cowardly. But under the feet of Jesus, Peter was tamed, polished and transformed. Although he sinned as grievously as Judas when he denied Jesus to save his own skin, his heart was truly and deeply convicted thereafter and he repented from his old man to follow Jesus even unto his death. This is also the same man who wrote in 1 Peter 1:6-7, 8-9, "There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you have to endure many trials for a little while. These trials will show that your faith is genuine. You love (Jesus Christ) even though you have never seen him. Though you do not see him now;...The reward for trusting him will be the salvation of your souls!"

Indeed, a befitting end to this letter would be to take a quote from Dr Stalker who describes Peter as such, "He (Christ) managed the tumultuous and fluctuating elements of his (Peter's) character as a perfect rider does a high mettled horse. He transformed a nature as unstable as water into the consistency of a rock." Beloved, let Jesus into your heart and transform you into what you were destined to be as a child of God. Remember, your heart, once guarded, is the wellspring of life and, if I may add, the wellspring of an abundant, meaningful and victorious life.

Have a wonderful, life-changing week ahead. Take good care, both heart and mind.

Ps: Last Friday, we also discussed about how we should share with someone who comes to us with this challenge, "Isn't it selfish and unfair for Christians to claim exclusivity to Heaven?" In summary, gathering the thoughts of all you guys, I can safely say that it is not selfish because the evangelical hook that gets genuine Christians to convert is not this: "If you accept Jesus, you go to Heaven...period, no question asked." Most preacher do not appeal to non-believer with this line because it turns newly minted believers into more of a cost-&-benefit analysing opportunist than a true disciple of God. And I am sure that believers who give their lives to God are, first and foremost, convicted by their sin and not by the thought of that newly furnished heavenly mansion.

So, heaven is hardly a factor in the mind of a true believer at the altar where it truly matters. That is why the witnessing approach should be to appeal to the heart rather than to the earthly senses of a bejeweled heaven covered in gold, brimming with joy and showered with endless praise. Secondly, it is not selfish because we have to come to a point in our argument to admit, with honesty and humility, that there is just something in life that is uncompromise-able, non-negotiable. It is just how this world works. For example, the law of gravity would show no partiality or favors to Mother Theresa, no matter how deserving she is, taking into account how sacrificial her life was on earth. The law of gravity does not distinguish between Mother Theresa and Adolf Hitler - that is, both will suffer the same fate if both were to jump off a cliff. Mother Theresa will not be "less hurt" than Hitler.

By the same token, heaven is a promise made to Christians and to them only. It is just how God operates. Without accepting Jesus, it is not possible for one to go to Heaven. If a convicted murderer on death row sincerely accepts Jesus in a sinner's prayer and dies together with a humble non-believer who had sacrificed his life to save a stranger by giving his heart to the latter, which one of them would go heaven? The answer is obvious. But the result as a whole is not selfish for the same reason that the law of gravity is not. (Having said this, I personally believe that God's judgment is always, and will always, be tempered with mercy just like the law of gravity can be tempered with in a space vacumn. But then, I am neither God nor an astronaut).

Finally, is it then unfair? Well, it surely is if Jesus had not made the way. Or, it surely is if Jesus, having made a way, made it almost impossible to achieve or made it almost impossible to tell if one is qualified enough to go heaven. But in all this, Jesus denied us not. He not only made a way, or the way, He made it easy - just a free will choice away - and gave us full assurance of salvation. In conclusion, Jesus did the following:-

1) Jesus made the first move;

2) Jesus made the ultimate painful sacrifice;

3) Jesus made the way achieveable;

4) Jesus made it costless - by grace through faith;

5) Jesus made it complete with full assurance of salvation;

6) Jesus made a difference unlike other religions;

7) Jesus made it there first to prepare the mansion for us.